Personalised cufflinks was one of the first items of jewellery that a friend asked me to make for her husband.

Here are the steps involved in making these cufflinks.

First you cut out your desired shape.

Then you file down the edges and corners to make sure you don’t get any sharp edges.

Next comes the personalisation, when stamping always place on an anvil.  If you stamp on wood or anything else you won’t get a great impression. You need one STRONG hit of the hammer. Practice elsewhere in case the letter / number is the wrong way round.  (I learned this the hard way)

Next step is soldering!  Some tips to solder.

1. Set up is key, once you are in the middle of soldering you don’t want to be searching around for tweezers or solder etc.
2. A clean join will mean a solid join
3. Keep breathing ☺

Once the soldering is done you need to pickle each piece to clean it up.

And next is riveting. I rivet my own cufflinks as I don’t risk melting the little spring inside the cufflink.

Once the cufflinks are one piece it is time to oxidise the top to show up the lovely stamping done earlier.  This is done with liver of sulphur which stinks like Rotorua! This needs to be done outside, unless you don’t mind the smell of rotten eggs of course….

Then brush back and polish! And there you have it.  Some awesome personalised cufflinks.

Thanks for reading I hope you enjoyed it.